The Name Game

Looking for a realistic British name for your model railway. Here’s 200 to get you started.

“A model railway isn’t a model railway until it has a name”.

I can’t remember who told me that but it’s a rule I’ve always stuck with.

Giving your layout makes it feel more real. It transforms it from being a collection of models to a glorious micro rendition of rural Britain.

But what to call it?

For my 1:76th scale layout, for example, this was just a case of using a mash-up of the real places where it’s set: in near Wimbledon, in South London, around the River Wandle… Hence Wandle Valley

But it’s not always so easy to come up a name.

You don’t really want to use a real place name (unless you are recreating that precise loco action in miniature) for fear of some asking why it doesn’t look like the real location.

At the same time coming up with genuine sounding but artificial place names can be surprisingly difficult. Somehow the made up names never have that unique quaintness of real British places. Just look at some of these real place names…